The Moment the Room Shifts
I have worked with a fair number of Cannes Lions winners.
They were talented. Sharp strategy. Killer copy. Presentations that hit different. All of it was real.
But there was always a moment in the meeting when the air changed.
We would be talking about solving a client’s problem, and then, without anyone noticing the switch, someone would say: “This could go to Cannes, don’t you think?” Eyes would light up. Voices would rise. Suddenly the whiteboard session had a different audience.
We had been talking about the client’s revenue. Now we were talking about our own careers.
The first time, I thought I was imagining it. After seeing it happen again and again, I knew I wasn’t.
Win Awards, Get Famous
Creatives in the ad industry want awards. Nobody is hiding it.
Win Cannes and you can go independent. Clients come to you by name. You get invited to speak at conferences. Juniors look up to you. You become attractive. All true.
So you go for it. Of course you do.
The problem is that you’re going for it on the client’s budget.
How much did that TVCF increase brand sales? Did that campaign actually move the client’s business forward? I never heard the answer. “Client ROI” is not a judging criterion at Cannes.
They evaluate creativity. They evaluate social impact. Fine. But what I saw on the ground was simpler than that.
Building your business card with the client’s money.
I watched it happen many times. These were talented people. That’s what made it worse.
Chasing Fame Rots the Work
Let me be clear — I’m not dismissing Cannes.
Awards serve a purpose. They raise the bar for the industry. They give young creatives something to aim for. They create a stage for new forms of expression. Acknowledged.
But the moment “I want to be famous” enters your motivation, the purity of the work drops. This is a structural problem.
The audience gets swapped. You stop making for the client’s end user and start making for the jury. The work starts existing for the maker’s career, not for the person who’s supposed to receive it.
I saw this up close, repeatedly. That’s why I don’t care about fame. It’s a choice made after seeing what fame-chasing does. Not posturing. Not humility. Distance, born from experience.
But Not Shipping Is a Different Story
Here’s the real point.
“Not caring about fame” and “not putting work out there” are completely different acts.
Fame is an outcome. Shipping is an action. Rejecting an outcome and stopping an action are separate decisions.
A chef who says “I don’t care about Michelin stars” — fair. A chef who says “I don’t care about Michelin stars, so I won’t open a restaurant” — that’s not a chef.
Plenty of people use “I don’t care about fame” as a shield to avoid shipping. Portfolio untouched for three years. Blog silent for six months. Zero mention of their work on social media.
Just say it. You’re scared. Scared of being criticized. Scared of being compared. Scared of being seen as mediocre.
Fear is normal. You’re exposing something internal to the outside world. Of course it’s scary.
But stop gift-wrapping that fear as “I’m not interested in fame.” That’s a lie you’re telling yourself.
Don’t Point the Mirror at the Jury
So if not for fame, then what for?
The mirror isn’t beautiful. The person reflected in it is.
Your work is a mirror. It reflects your thinking, your taste, your standards. But a mirror doesn’t exist for itself. It exists for the person looking into it.
I once worked on a project for a European luxury sports car brand. The concept I planned was an AR app that let you see the car parked in your own garage.
Who was it for? Not people who already owned one. It was for the people who dreamed of it but couldn’t buy one without stretching. Every morning they’d walk past an empty parking spot — but hold up their phone, and there it was. Their future car, waiting.
Could this have won at Cannes? AR × automotive × emotion. All the ingredients juries love. But not once during the planning did I picture a jury member’s face. The only face I saw was someone coming home, looking at their garage, and thinking “someday.”
The work belongs to the client. And beyond the client, to the end user. Who are you looking at when you work? That’s all there is to it — yet the moment awards enter the picture, so many people lose sight of exactly that.
The Cannes winners I knew were pointing the mirror at the jury.
Point the mirror at the person who needs to see it. Polishing it and locking it in a drawer is a denial of what mirrors are for.
We Ship. We Own.
No label. Not a “production company.” Not a “creative boutique.” The moment you claim a category, you’re contained by it.
Air doesn’t advertise. But everyone who breathes will find it.
You don’t have to care about fame. You don’t have to go viral. You don’t have to win Cannes.
But ship.
Write what you think. Show what you build. Talk about what failed. Ship before it’s perfect.
We ship. We own. Put it out. Take responsibility for what you put out.
If you’ve genuinely discarded fame as a motivator, the only reason left to ship is 100% pure: you want it to reach someone. That’s the strongest motivation there is.
The people who worked for awards will probably never understand that.